Storyboard:

Title:

1937- Stalin the dictator: victims of Joseph Stalin's Great Purge, repression in the Soviet Union

Rights-Managed,
Editorial

Location and time:

Soviet Union, Moscow, 1937

Description:

The Great Purge was a series of campaigns of political repression and persecution in the Soviet Union orchestrated by Joseph Stalin from 1936 to 1938. It involved a large-scale purge of the Communist Party and government officials, repression of peasants, Red Army leadership, and the persecution of unaffiliated persons, characterized by widespread police surveillance, widespread suspicion of "saboteurs", imprisonment, and arbitrary executions.

Joseph Stalin was a Bolshevik revolutionary and a political leader in the Soviet Union. Stalin became general secretary of the Soviet Communist Party in 1922; following the death of Vladimir Lenin, he prevailed over Leon Trotsky in a power struggle during the 1920s and fully consolidated his authority with the Great Purge, a period of severe repression which reached its peak in 1937, remaining in power through World War II and until his death. Stalin molded the features that characterized the new Soviet regime; his policies, based on Marxist-Leninist ideology, are often considered to represent a political and economic system called Stalinism.

Sound Bite and conversation:

Antonov-Ovsejenko, Anton

(Son of one of Lenin’s fellow) , speaking Russian: - "Take for example the quota of woodsmen –elimination of the most active people of the country had to be fulfilled. Often it was topped. This was the Stalin terror.
"

Herwarth, Hans von

(german diplomat) , speaking German: - "Stalin could be very warmhearted, unlike Hitler. He was an inhumane beast, a criminal, but a very nice and friendly one.
"

Rikova, Natalja

(The daughter of the political committee's member (A. Rikova)) , speaking Russian: - "After the arrest of my mother, first I lost my job. Nobody wanted to employ me after that...and it lasted about 20 years. 20 years of prison, concentration camp and deportation.
"

Antonov-Ovsejenko, Anton

(Son of one of Lenin’s fellow) , speaking Russian: - "Stalin encouraged this mass hysteria.
Demonstrations, mottos, party meetings – with all this he had to verify the happening not only for the world public. The violence of soviet power was hidden behind a huge curtain from his own folk as well.
"

Antonov-Ovsejenko, Anton

(Son of one of Lenin’s fellow) , speaking Russian: - "Of course he didn’t want to resign. This was only a test. He wanted to check who was still standing by him. The truth is that he thought he was irreplaceable.
"

Rikova, Natalja

(The daughter of the political committee's member (A. Rikova)) , speaking Russian: - "One trial came after the other. First against so called Trockists such as Sinovjev and Kamenev. Bucharin’s and Rikov’s – my fathers’ – name was mentioned as well. I was young and asked my mother: “Mom does this mean that they are going to be executed? She answered: of course.
"

Antonov-Ovsejenko, Anton

(Son of one of Lenin’s fellow) , speaking Russian: - "Stalin got extremely frightened. He was scared that in the critical year of 1932 his comrades would exclude him from the party.
"

Bucharina, Svetlana

(Bucharin’s daughter) , speaking Russian: - "To arrest my father who was a revolutionist and was present from the very beginning – this was totally absurd.
And of course on made-up charges."

Additional infos:

This film is part of a 100-episode series "20th Century: 100 Years - 100 Events - 100 Films."
The entire series is available either as a master, or with voice-overs in the following languages: English, German, Hungarian, Russian, Czech and Slovak - and can be purchased individually or as a whole.